Google/Oracle’s $9B Copyright Case Could Be Headed for the Supreme Court

https://www.newsweek.com/2019/06/07/google-oracle-copyright-case-supreme-court-1433037.html

by lawrenceyan • 7 years ago

162 261 7 years ago

newsweek.com

panpanna4• 7 years ago

I'm surprised the board at Oracle has let things go this far.

Google could probably do a lot of damage to Oracle if they wanted.

AsusFan• 7 years ago

How so?

Google has already been found guilty of Copyright Infringement (and then admitted it by invoking the "fair use" defense).

They are in the hole already. This is just ironing out the details of how much Google is in the hole.

panpanna4• 7 years ago

Buddy, EVERYTHING in this trial is about fair use.

Oracle using a technicality to ask 9B for something they used to give away for free can backfire.

exabrial2• 7 years ago

Is there anything we can do as developers? Obviously I don't want to DDOS/DOX the supreme court, but can we write letters or do anything else to show _how massively important_ this is?

EDIT: For those unable to read between the lines, HN is a large forum read by thousands of people of different backgrounds. Often when someone suggests something, small actions can add up to create a large problem. DDOSing/Doxing is never acceptable for any situation. I want to "do something" but without accidentally creating a problem.

panpanna4• 7 years ago

A lot of people/companies contacted the judges last time but some were actually companies backing Oracle (eg microsoft?)

What you can do as a developer is to ensure your company is not using any of oracles cash cows.

mlinksva• 7 years ago

EFF has collected all of the briefs submitted throughout the dispute at https://www.eff.org/cases/oracle-v-google

I don't recall any computer/software companies actually backing Oracle, other than Oracle itself.

Justin_K• 7 years ago

Why would the thought of DDOSing the supreme court even cross your mind?

ummonk• 7 years ago

If every developer wrote a letter to the SC, that might (depending on how they handle such letters) function as an inadvertent DDoS - similar to the HN hug of death.

JudgeWapner3• 7 years ago

How does it impact us as developers either way? Both are titans that have contributed vital pieces of tech infrastructure as well as committed evil acts in their space. Oracle is arguably more evil here, but is it that big of a tragedy if Google loses? They have obscene amounts of cash; what difference does it make if a pile of cash goes from one evil pocket to another? Please if you downvote give an explanation. I honestly want to know what's at stake here for us.

lloydde2• 7 years ago

How does it impact us as developers either way?

“Treating APIs as copyrightable has a profound negative impact on interoperability and innovation. And it goes against decades of tradition and common practice in the software world.”

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/05/eff-asks-federal-circu...

khc• 7 years ago

If Oracle wins, next time you re-implement an existing API someone can sue you.

jpalomaki• 7 years ago

Well at stake is ”Can you own the copyright of an API”. I think this is a pretty big question.

Not sure how this affects some other domains, like company A developing their own new database engine that shares API with some existing db (to facilitate easy migration).

kabwj• 7 years ago

On one hand I hate google. On the other oracle winning could mean the end of wine. My heart is divided.

rrix2• 7 years ago

but is it that big of a tragedy if Google loses?

considering the fallout would extend far past Google, yes.

ergothus• 7 years ago

Donate to the EFF - they write amicus briefs and generally empower the legal profession to have that understanding.

That said, courts generally don't focus on "how important" something is - that's supposed to be Congress' job. The exceptions are where the importance triggers some other area of law.

caymanjim• 7 years ago

You say this as though you'd normally DOS or dox someone you disagree with, or that it's a normal course of action for a developer, or something that a reasonable person would consider.

jcranmer4• 7 years ago

There is already a long list of amici curiae filings at SCOTUS asking them to look into this case and helping inform them: https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/google-llc-v-ora...

This is still in certiorari phase (i.e., SCOTUS hasn't decided whether or not to hear it), but there's already 15 separate briefs filed all urging SCOTUS to hear the case, and only Oracle is opposing it. There's nothing you can do at this point to urge SCOTUS as to whether or not to hear it.

Assuming that SCOTUS will hear the case (which is probably pretty likely--this is a Big, Important IP question which means the only reason not to hear it is if there's a better case coming along soon to hear it), the best chance at influence is an amicus curiae at that point. Talking to your company's legal representation is probably the best bet to get on one of the amicus curiae, but if you don't have any legal experience, you're probably not going to be capable of writing an effective amicus.

jandrese6• 7 years ago

There is also the not-unlikely possibility that the court takes the case but then rules in an extremely narrow way that leaves open the larger question about the copyrightability of APIs.

Sacho• 7 years ago

It appears they denied the previous petition from Google in 2015. Why is this one different?

kevin_b_er3• 7 years ago

I'm not sure what can be done. The entire software industry is threatened by Orcale's greed at this point.

pubkraal• 7 years ago

If anyone knows, how much would this affect non-US technology processes and legislature? What would an outcome of this mean for Asia and Europe?

orra• 7 years ago

What Google did is very clearly lawful under European Union law.

The Software Directive explicitly permits reverse engineering for interoperability.

Interoperability is not explicitly defined, but is widely understood to relate to interfaces. API, or Application Programming Interfaces, are of course interfaces. Hence you can reverse engineer APIs to create something interoperable, without infringing copyright.

This topic has even gone to the CJEU, the top European court. World Programming implemented a language and library compatible with SAS. SAS sued. Ultimately, the court found in favour of World Programming.

Of course, despite reimplementation of APIs clearly being legal in Europe, a ban in the US could still have a chilling effect, due to the international and cross border nature of software development.

orthoxerox4• 7 years ago

Except Google didn't provide interoperability, you can't run Java applications on Android. A lens company can study how a camera company mount works and sell compatible lenses. A camera company cannot study another camera company's mount to make an incompatible mount that uses similar circuitry and protocols to help lens companies support it faster.

wharfjumper• 7 years ago

US legislation and precedents are not binding in other legal jurisdictions throughout Asia and Europe. There are international agreements (such as TRIPS[0]) that aim to provide a degree of intellectual property law consistency across the world but if Oracle prevails in this case it does not follow that APIs would be automatically copyrightable in all TRIPS signatory nations.

However a visit or letter from a large litigious opponent is likely to strike fear into the hearts of most regardless of the legal merits of the case. For example this has been effective for Microsoft in licensing patents they cover aspects of the Android operating system[1].

0. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRIPS_Agreement 1. https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/microsoft_on_the_issues/...

kodablah2• 7 years ago

"Before Android," Oracle’s lawyers write in their brief to the Supreme Court, "every company that wanted to use the Java platform took a commercial license...including smartphone manufacturers BlackBerry, Nokia and Danger."

Either that's word twisting (e.g. "platform" means something different or the commercial license was implicit) or just false.

stefan_2• 7 years ago

What they licensed to BlackBerry, Nokia and Danger was of course the Java ME runtime.

alfalfasprout2• 7 years ago

It's mindblowing how so many developers are quick to build on the Java ecosystem... an ecosystem backed by a company so hell-bent on stifling innovation.

panpanna4• 7 years ago

Java was created by Sun. Oracle bought them mainly to sue Google.

Kotlin from jetbrains is where developer mindshare is today ;)

pier255• 7 years ago

But Kotlin does run on Oracle's JVM, no?

the8472• 7 years ago

OpenJDK is under GPL (+exceptions) now, it wasn't at the time. As long as you don't use oracle's binary builds these concerns don't apply anymore.

alfalfasprout2• 7 years ago

It's GPL but still predominantly influenced and largely developed by Oracle. They won't be responsive to the needs and wants of the community and are backed by evil business practices.

duxup• 7 years ago

How many developers make that decision as far as work goes?

mcbutterbunz• 7 years ago

Every developer that continues to use Java or takes on a project that uses Java makes that decision, either explicitly or not. The market for Java developers exist because Java developers keep developing in Java.

I'm not arguing for OP though, I'm just saying that we all have a choice in what technology to use.

jryan495• 7 years ago

People have been using Java for decades, when it wasn't even backed by Oracle. It's impractical to think people can just throw out millions of lines of Java code and hours of experience and knowledge just because of some "omg Oracle evil" argument.

exabrial2• 7 years ago

You may want to consider this affects literally every piece of software in every language that has ever called into another library.

vxNsr2• 7 years ago

This is the first time I've read anything in depth about this and I gotta say Oracle's case feels stronger and google is tilting at windmills. Oracle wrote something, google copied it.

Oracle isn't arguing that you can't use java api's in general without a license. Its arguing that if you wanna create a new platform you can't copy copyrighted code. Doesn't matter how small it is, google has demonstrated that it was intentional and instrumental in helping android grow.

kodablah2• 7 years ago

That's akin to saying that someone wrote about English grammar and you copied it in your comment by structuring your sentence in a certain way, using punctuation, etc.

vxNsr2• 7 years ago

It's more akin to someone who wrote a book and I copied the title and each chapter heading and then rewrote each chapter in my own words.

ocdtrekkie7• 7 years ago

Yeah, that's the thing: Google knew it should've paid, it looked into a license, and then decided to claim it didn't need one and go without. It's certainly not fair use, it was specifically to build a competing product/commercial ecosystem to Oracle's and they state it was fundamental to their strategy to do so.

This case has been going on since 2010. It's time Google let it go. They lost.

mjw10073• 7 years ago

What Google looked into licensing was considerably broader than the APIs, and included material that everyone agrees is copyrightable.

We don't learn anything from the fact that Google negotiated for a broad licence, decided not to take one, and used a clone which copies only the API definitions.

If API definitions aren't copyrightable then Google didn't do anything wrong. If they are then it did.

The idea that API definitions may not be copyrightable certainly isn't a wild theory that Google made up for this instance.

icebraining9• 7 years ago

It's certainly not fair use, it was specifically to build a competing product/commercial ecosystem to Oracle's

The commercial nature of the work is just one factor determining fair use. Another is "the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole". And the API structure is a quite small part of the JDK as a whole, and has a different nature than implementation code as well.

nullwasamistake2• 7 years ago

They copied the API interfaces. I'm sure every developer has done the same a multitude of times. If you want to talk to the same REST API using the same client, you've probably written an exact copy of the code a bunch of others have written.

Computer science reverse engineering often means recreating the same code, maybe even line by line. Allowing anyone to copyright an API would break the internet.

Imagine writing quicksort in a popular language as an excercise. Usually there's only a few straightforward ways to do it, so the same code has been written tons of times. If the original writer had copywrite, nobody could use quicksort.

smeyer• 7 years ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding of copyright is that if you come up with something independently you're not violating copyright. So if you and I both write code to interact with the same REST API and end up writing identical code, there's no violation.

But Google didn't just coincidentally happen to match the Java api; they intentionally copied the method signatures then reimplemented the methods. The issue at hand is copying all the method signatures, not reimplementing the methods. I don't know whether that is or should be a copyright violation or not, but it's different from what you described in your comment.

nradov3• 7 years ago

This case is not about copying copyrighted code. It's about APIs.

wuliwong9• 7 years ago

I'm having a little trouble understanding the distinction. An API is still defined by code though. It's basically just the publicly facing part of the code, right?

swang• 7 years ago

Google’s argument is that method declarations are not code. And since this case is about copyright the question is whether declarations like that are ideas that can be protected under copyright law.

Is math.abs with one parameter copyrightable? What about Math.abs?

If it was so cut and dry this case wouldn’t have dragged on

tzs3• 7 years ago

Would you argue that WINE should need a license from Microsoft, because it has copied APIs from Windows?

binthere• 7 years ago

I must admit I have not been following this case too close. But I get the general sense that most people in the CS community is in favor or Google and against Oracle. I'd like to understand it better.

Can someone please explain in technical terms exactly what Google copied and what is Oracle complaining about? Is it just the Java API declarations? Most of the articles I find try to explain the issue in layman's terms which makes it harder for me to understand exactly what was copied.

dmitrygr5• 7 years ago

Google REIMPLEMENTED base classes to match what a normal Java app would expect. They complied with the public API as you'd find in javadocs. Oracle claims that is infringement because to make that work, their method signatures look identical to oracle's (and thus Oracle claims they were copied, in violation of copyright law). Google claims that API cannot be copyrightable by definition (an argument that most programmers agree with I feel)

There was also a bit of similar code for obvious reasons. For example, how many ways are there to implement "bool rangeCheck(int idxRequested, int maxValidIdx, int minValidIdx)"?

krn• 7 years ago

Is it similar to how Preact just implements React's API? So the problem here is, that Java's API is not under MIT? And what about all those competing companies that implement AWS S3's API?

nailer2• 7 years ago

The article says:

after Google incorporated 11,500 lines of Oracle’s Java code

I'm pretty sure the article is wrong and you're right as that's consistent with what I've read before.

blackhaz• 7 years ago

I wonder if this is somehow similar to how PC clones reimplemented IBM PC's BIOS. Can this be used as a precedent in this case?

SilasX5• 7 years ago

Is there a reason this just applies to software, or is the principle more general?

In a sense, Wendy’s “reimplements” the “supersize my combo meal” interface.[1] They call it “biggie-sizing”, but...

Let’s say Wendy’s instructs employees that “if someone asks for a meal to be supersized, handle the request as if they had asked for it to be biggie-sized”. Could that conceivably be an API copyright violation?

[1] McDonald’s lets you “supersize” your order which means paying extra to get a larger drink and order of fries.

tamrix• 7 years ago

To run Java on your devices, you have to get it licensed. It takes lots of money and time to create a rich ecosystem like Java. Google never paid for permission to use Java in andriod. Instead they copied Java and deliberately went around all the the patients and copywrite which includes the API debate as evidence google deliberately avoided copywrite.

If you look at this morally, Google used Java without paying. Pay up. If you look at this under a lens. Google never broke any laws because they looked up every patient and copywrite Oracle now owns and went around it. So technically, they didn't copy anything Oracle claims to own. All except, for one little minor detail in the API copywrite. Which of they can prove, then google stole Java.

Unfortunately, Google is very good at PR and has quite a big fan base. So all you'll hear is praise for the GOOG.

sytelus• 7 years ago

On one hand I feel APIs are an important asset for any business. Platforms and programs can literally succeed or fail because of how their APIs are designed. Personally, I've spent as much as 1/3rd of my time on some projects in just thinking about APIs and go through dozens of iterations. If someone then copies verbatim, I would certainly feel getting robbed. On the other hand, APIs has to be public and copiable for people to do things like mocks or wrappers. Also, re-implementation is what allows progress and competition. It doesn't seem like a good thing for society for APIs as uncopiable without royalty. It looks like we are literally here on the edge of reasoning trying to argue if the border of your house is also your property. These are the kind of philosophy-heavy cases SC should definitely spend time on.

uluyol• 7 years ago

The case has evolved quite a bit, so here's a quick summary:

- Oracle claimed that Google copied parts of Java for Android

- Claims about copying code were weak (very little was copied) so that was dropped and this became a question about copying the Java APIs

- The judge initially on the case (Alsup) had the jury assume that APIs could be copyrighted and they said it was a copyright violation

- Same judge then declared that APIs cannot be copyrighted

- Oracle appeals to Federal Circuit (?) which declared that APIs can indeed be copyrighted

- Case sent back down to Alsup and Google found guilty

- Google appeal to the Supreme Court

Now the question is will they agree whether APIs can be copyrighted or not. If so, then Google is far from the only victim here, as anyone reimplementing someone else's API is in trouble.

jpollock• 7 years ago

It would also mean that all the PC BIOS manufacturers have been violating IBM's copyright for decades.

nradov3• 7 years ago

Just to be pedantic, Google wasn't found guilty. Since this is a civil case they were only found liable.

jonny_eh2• 7 years ago

Wouldn't AMD be guilty of copying the x86 instruction set then?

tzs3• 7 years ago

You missed a couple. Somewhere in there after it was declared that APIs can be copyrighted, the district court found that Google's use of them was fair use, and then the Federal Circuit overruled that, too.

zaphar• 7 years ago

Not just reimplementing. If you for instance have to call an external service and you mock their API for testing then you've violated copyright. The same thing if you create a Facade for that API. Just as a matter of course everyday that you write code you are probably interacting with or creating code that violates this Copyright.

* Implementing a Language Spec? Copyright violation.

* Mocking an external service? Copyright violation.

* Wrapping a library call? Copyright violation.

The ability treat an interface as a distinctly different thing from an implementation is core to what we do in our jobs everyday. And the importance of being able to use, wrap, or mock out an interface without fear of legal jeopardy is essential to being able to do the work that we do.

snarfy• 7 years ago

//adds two numbers

int add(int a, int b);

Oracle is claiming nobody else is allowed to make an add() method with that signature.

conanbatt• 7 years ago

int add(int x, int y);

Can I get a corporate lawyer's salary now

shmageggy3• 7 years ago

IANAL but even if it's determined that APIs are copyrightable, `add(...)` would almost certainly be considered public domain. There's no way to track down the original author, and whoever it was never claimed ownership

rhino3692• 7 years ago

It’s more complex than that. Copyright only forbids copying. Truly independent arrival at the same work isn’t actionable. So if the only overlap in code is this sort of coincidental or “there is really only one way to do this” situations, you shouldn’t be found liable.

Think of it like I Want To Hold Your Hand by the Beatles. I bet 500 songs used the line “I feel happy inside,” but it’s not copyright infringement.

But if steal half the lyrics, it’s infringement. Same would be true for APIs, if they are found to be copyrightable.

orthoxerox4• 7 years ago

Google copied the API, but didn't make the runtime compatible with Java ME, SE or EE. Oracle says you can reimplement Java API, but only if you're making a complete Java-compatible runtime, one you can run a regular .class or a .jar in. If you simply reuse some APIs because you want to exploit people's familiarity with Java APIs, you are committing copyright infringement.

Oletros• 7 years ago

Java EE is not compatible with Java ME

wtallis6• 7 years ago

Compatibility is a requirement for using the Java TCK and getting permission to use the Java trademarks. I don't believe Oracle has ever made it clear what the conditions are for getting a copyright license for the API alone.

curt153• 7 years ago

One of the four fundamental factors in any fair use determination is the "the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole". If Oracle wants to claim that Google effectively didn't copy enough of Java, it sounds like they need new law.

CobrastanJorji• 7 years ago

Yes, this is the Java API declarations. If you open up the JavaDoc for Java and look at the list of classes and functions, stuff like java.util.HashMap and System.out.println. Google wrote all of those classes and methods from scratch. Oracle's claim is that this was not okay because copyright covers APIs.

If true, this would have some fascinating consequences. For example, HTTP is an API. Presumably Tim Berners-Lee could sue the creators and users of all HTTP servers for violating his copyright.

(note: not a lawyer, not even all that smart)

snarf21• 7 years ago

I'm on Google's side for two reasons. 1) API compatibility is good for all of us and what happens if someone claims copyright on a function that adds to integers? 2) And most importantly, Oracle bought SUN for sole explicit purpose of trying to shakedown Google over Android. This isn't a case of not being able to recoup time and money for Oracle. It is a sham and akin to patent trolls. I hope they continue to wither and die.

nlewycky• 7 years ago

Oracle's remaining claim is that functions having particular names and belonging to particular packages is copyrighted by them and was replicated by Google. For example, the function to calculate the sine of an angle is named 'sin' and belongs to the Math package. They don't claim any particular text was copied, they claim that this structure, sequence and organization (SSO) of the functions was copied from Java. Supposing Oracle's legal theory were correct, this would give rise to two major categories of problems.

If you accept that the organization of a library of functions is copyrighted and requires a license to reproduce, it leads to the question of whether a program which merely uses said library would be considered a reproduction. When writing a library I might declare that 'sin' is in 'Math' by writing "namespace Math { float sin(float); }" which programmers call a declaration. Someone using the library might write "float sine = Math::sin(angle_as_float);", but as a programmer you can look at that call and see that it tells you that 'sin' is in the 'Math' package, same as the declaration. If Oracle's lawsuit is successful, and we agree that using a function is a reproduction of its SSO, all programs which merely interface with any other program through a library of functions would be copying the SSO. Given that nobody in the industry has ever considered SSO of an interface to be copyrightable, we've never made technical decisions or built legal agreements around it. The immediate effect is that decades of software written to run on top of Windows would suddenly discover that their code is jointly copyright Microsoft, users of an SQL database would discover that their database queries are jointly copyright the SQL server vendor or the SQL specification authors or both, and on and on across the entirety of computing.

The second issue is that Java was not the first language to put the 'sin' function in the 'math' package. For example, C places 'sin' inside 'math.h'. Is there someone with standing to sue Oracle for copying C? It's not like people really create interfaces out of whole cloth very often, you can usually find the incremental progression and improvement over time.

I expect that corporations will simply ignore the bad ruling if it does come down. If they didn't the number of new license negotiations and lawsuits would be staggering.

gingabriska• 7 years ago

Google says it did clean room implementation but investigation uncovers that Google copied and pasted a lot of code to rush through development and there were strict guidelines set to remove the use of word "Java" from the source code repository which even delayed some of their launch

So Google might have simply used Java's code without ever being able to source a license. So here the case is not merely copying API but source code too.

If you read the case history, even Google's key employees knew this, they were worried and they did try to acquire the license till end but failed to do so, they proceed to move on with the project. (Disruption mindset? Will pay the fine if caught later?)

Google surely underestimated who they were messing with.

wuliwong9• 7 years ago

I'm trying to understand what was copied by Google.

Did they copy the core class names and the different method and attribute names for these objects but rewrote everything else from scratch?

I dont know java but but lets say it was ruby and then i made xruby and copied the same type of things. So, Random.rand (in xruby) still produced a similar random Float like in ruby. But the code that was called by Random.rand was entirely written by me from scratch? Is that the idea?

__david__• 7 years ago

Yes, that is exactly it.

orthoxerox4• 7 years ago

Imagine Ruby was closed source, but you were allowed to make open source implementations that ran Ruby programs.

Then you implement a language called Crystal that uses Ruby syntax and its stdlib looks a lot like Ruby's, but it can't run Rails because it's designed for car navigators, not webapps.

The Ruby Company comes after you and says that if you wanted to reuse their APIs you should've bought a license.

wuliwong9• 7 years ago

Interesting. I was thinking it was like google copy and pasted oracle's code, kept the function definitions and then re-wrote the innards. To me if code is truly treated as a literary work then it doesn't really matter how the end product behaves. It matters whether the text was copied.

In the case of ruby vs crystal, I think the courts will rule on the side of crystal!

bitwize5• 7 years ago

The Supreme Court should, and probably will, deny cert.

Read the CAFC's opinion. Pretty cut and dry in favor of Oracle. APIs are not an abstract idea, but a concrete expression of an idea, thus protected by copyright. Google could have chosen its own expression, but decided to copy Oracle, which is against the law.

nailer2• 7 years ago

So does that mean Word, which implemented WordPerfect APIs, is illegal?

And Lunacy and Figma shouldn't be able to open Sketch files?

Edit: if it's unclear, making APIs patentable would prevent all of the above. API compatibility is essential to compete with big players.

monocasa10• 7 years ago

Or Oracle when they implemented SQL?

e1ven• 7 years ago

Under that interpretation, I'm curious what you view as different than IBM vs Compaq about the original PC bios?

bitwize5• 7 years ago

The law is the law. Wishing it were different doesn't make it so. Which means that yes, Compaq and other PC clone makers may have broken the law by reimplementing the PC BIOS. The BIOS API does not depend on named functions but rather on specific values appearing in CPU registers, so I'm not sure how copyright applies to that. Maybe a "structure, sequence, and organization" argument à la Whelan v. Jaslow.

icebraining9• 7 years ago

The SCOTUS already denied cert on the question of copyrightability. The question now is whether it's fair use.

bitwize5• 7 years ago

It isn't fair use. Fair use under U.S. law refers to excerpting a copyrighted work for certain purposes including news reporting, research, scholarship, criticism, and parody. If Google copied the APIs without any of these uses in mind (almost a certainty in the case of Android), they infringed on Oracle's copyright. Period.

nradov3• 7 years ago

I hope Google wins the legal case for the sake of maintaining an innovative software industry. But at the same time I still think that they acted like jerks by creating their own proprietary pseudo Java for Android rather than negotiating a formal agreement with Sun. Now the Java ecosystem is fragmented so many Java tools and libraries can't be used for Android development. That's bad for everyone.

mjw10073• 7 years ago

As far as I'm concerned, it's a huge failure that, over thirty years after computer programs were explicitly added to copyright law, it isn't clear to what extent APIs are copyrightable, and we have to watch lawyers argue over strained analogies to chapter titles in Harry Potter books.

I think the process where the legislature writes a vague law and leaves it for the courts to decide what it actually means over a series of cases has fallen down badly here.

dmitrygr5• 7 years ago

Do you really want our senators, who usually old enough to remember hunting dinosaurs, writing these laws though? At least in court informed experts can be called. Congress only hears from experts if they so choose (surprise: they usually don't so choose)

mjw10073• 7 years ago

I think there are other options.

We could do a better job of getting test cases through the courts that clarify the law.

Or we could invent new mechanisms for turning rulings from specific cases into general principles that people can rely on.

Or we could allow somewhat more hypothetical cases in certain circumstances.

As I understand it, in the US, after a few cases like the Phoenix BIOS one people came to believe that a clean-room reimplementation of an exisiting interface was generally permitted, and so people stopped suing and we didn't get a flow of cases exploring the limits of that principle.

So now when Oracle comes along and points out that the Java API is a lot bigger, and arguably more creative, than the PC BIOS call interface, there isn't an existing case that settles the question.

I can see why there's reluctance to allow people to get courts to decide hypothetical questions, but this case seems to be a decent example of when it would be helpful: if Google had had the option of getting a ruling ahead of time on whether its Java library clone was permitted, it might have saved an awful lot of time and money.

jcranmer4• 7 years ago

What do you think lobbyists are for?

tzs3• 7 years ago

As far as I'm concerned, it's a huge failure that, over thirty years after computer programs were explicitly added to copyright law, it isn't clear to what extent APIs are copyrightable, and we have to watch lawyers argue over strained analogies to chapter titles in Harry Potter books.

It was pretty clear, until this case. What's different here is that Oracle initially had both patent and copyright claims, and appeals to cases involving patents go to the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit (CAFC) instead of to the appeals court that normally serves the district court that came from (9th Circuit, in this case).

When an appeal goes to CAFC because of patent claims, CAFC handles the entire appeal. Result: instead of this being decided be an appellate court that has extensive experience in copyright (9th Circuit) in this case, and even with similar issues within copyright, it ends up at CAFC which is not nearly as experienced in the relevant areas of law.

CAFC is supposed to follow the precedent from the circuit the appeal came from in matters like this that hitched a ride with a patent issue, which is why there was so much surprise and consternation at their ruling. As far as I can see, most lawyers and legal scholars though 9th Circuit precedent would result in a win for Google.

Personally, I dislike the way other things piggyback their way to CAFC. Besides the problem mentioned above of it putting issues before CAFC that they are not experienced with, it also makes for weird precedent.

Whenever CAFC goes in a different direction from one of the regular appeals courts, you then have a situation where you effectively have two different rules in that area in that circuit, one for when the case also has a patent issue and one for when it does not.

kevin_b_er3• 7 years ago

CAFC has continually shown itself as a renegade court which might be corrupted or captured by the "intellectual property" industry. We can presume they will consider everything copyrightable and everything patentable. They've continually tried to circumvent supreme court rulings to make things more patentable. The same can be applied to copyright.

johannes1234321• 7 years ago

30 years were the Unix wars. I wonder what consequence were if APIs were considered then.

ApolloFortyNine• 7 years ago

My big issue with vague laws is that decisions with colossal impact in the United States are determined by 9 people.

And sometimes laws simply get reinterpreted, after hundreds of years precedent.

tdhoot2• 7 years ago

This is really a failure of Congress. SCOTUS shouldn't even be in the business of forcing reinterpretations of these laws - Congress should realize it's being (mis/re)-interpreted and reactively clarify. That's how the system worked until we got a deadlocked legislature and it's how it works in other countries.

liara_k2• 7 years ago

The aspect of this case that I don't understand is why, even if APIs are copyrightable, why Google would need a special license for the Android. If Java is available under the GPL, and Android is a derivative work but is also licensed under the GPL, then where's the problem?

Conversely, by Oracle's logic, any application that uses the Java API would be a derivative work (the method signatures are perfect copies), and thus the app would need to be either GPL itself or pay for a commercial license for Java. This, too, seems incompatible with existing practice (e.g., Apache's Java applications are licensed under its own open-source license which is more permissive and thus can't be a derivative work under the GPL.

What am I missing here?

CodeArtisan• 7 years ago

IIRC, Google copy/pasted code from Apache Harmony which wasn't legal itself.

edit:

http://www.groklaw.net/pdf3/OraGoogle-959.pdf

"Two of the three questions from the jurors have focused on Apache, but the issue is actually very simple: Apache never obtained any license from Sun permitting its use of the Java specifications for Harmony. As made clear by Apache itself, Apache never had a license from Sun or Oracle for Harmony. Apache had no rights to Java technology that it could give to Google. This not even a case in which there is a “cloud over Apache,” to use the Court’s phrase (4/20/2012 Trial Tr. 1114:16-20). Apache simply had no title at all, and has publicly conceded as much: When Apache resigned from the JCP in protest based on its inability to obtain a license, it stated in its resignation that the “Java specifications are proprietary technology that must be licensed directly from the spec lead under whatever terms the spec lead chooses.” (TX 1045 at p. 2.) Thus, Google’s use of Apache Harmony provides no defense for Google. Oracle seeks an instruction to the jury that will prevent confusion and clarify that Google’s use of Harmony provides no defense to Oracle’s copyright infringement claims."

curt153• 7 years ago

"When Apache resigned from the JCP in protest based on its inability to obtain a license..."

Wasn't Apache seeking a license for a collection of tests, not the right to implement the API itself? And what, under Oracle's argument, would be the legal status of GNU GCJ/Classpath?

theandrewbailey• 7 years ago

IANAL, but this is how I understand it:

The GPL only means that you can read, run, change, and distribute code. It does not affect copyright. The individuals/companies working on a GPL program still retain their copyright for each bit of code contributed (authored). Because of that, copying code into a completely different program without consent of each author can be problematic. In addition, only the authors can sue to enforce the license.

This is why the FSF requires contributors to assign copyright to the FSF: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-assign.en.html

barkingcat2• 7 years ago

This doesn't apply because the implementation that Google used wasn't GPLed at all.

icebraining9• 7 years ago

The GPL lets you copy code into a completely different program, it's just that you still have to follow the license and comply with all its requirements.

comex• 7 years ago

For your first point, Google was trying to avoid the GPL (for whatever reason), but since the lawsuit they’ve switched from Apache Harmony to OpenJDK in order to take advantage of it:

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2016/01/android-n-switch...

For your second point, using an API is different from consuming it; among other things, you don’t generally copy and paste the full method declarations into your own code.

monocasa10• 7 years ago

OpenJDK wasn't out yet, so they weren't avoiding the GPL, they were avoiding the proprietary license that the Sun JRE was distributed with at that time.

barkingcat2• 7 years ago

Because Google didn't use Java as distributed by Oracle/Sun or the Java with the GPL license. (in the timeline of the dispute)

Google used an Apache licensed re-implementation called Harmony, which was GPL incompatible to begin with. (The project was created specifically to not be GPL licensed, to AVOID the GPL as well as to negate any GPL protections)

geofft4• 7 years ago

Wikipedia says:

"At this point in time, the OpenJDK implementation offered by Sun was not as mature or complete as the Java Standard Edition. Instead of licensing Java, Google chose to develop a cleanroom version of the Java Standard Edition libraries, developing the libraries from a completely fresh start without any access to Sun's code."

OpenJDK was released in 2007. Android was founded in 2003 and acquired by Google in 2005. It's entirely possible that if the schedules had been shifted a few years, Android would have gone with OpenJDK.

Note that OpenJDK is available under the GPL with the "classpath exception," allowing you to link non-GPL software against it (sorta like the LGPL). Android avoids the GPL in userspace, to the extent of writing their own libc (apparently glibc being under LGPL was not enough).

liara_k2• 7 years ago

Ah, THAT makes sense. Not having their own system licensed under the GPL would explain why licensing of OpenJDK doesn't make the question irrelevant, and the timeline explains why they didn't just use OpenJDK directly. Thanks!

Also, OpenJDK is now 12 years old... It seems like forever, and it's kind of weird that events that old are still relevant to live legal disputes, but... I guess that's the speed of software vs. the speed of the U.S. legal system... ;)

stefan_2• 7 years ago

When Android was started, no embedded system of any kind used glibc. It's now 2019 and still none do. It's not GPL avoidance, it's just glibc being (a) huge (pain) for all the wrong reasons.

sarcasmic• 7 years ago

This whole case is contrived, and both actors acted in bad faith, so the outcome will be troubling no matter what.

If Oracle wins, others can claim that their API is copyrighted and weaponize copyright law to sue anyone they don't want to interoperate with them -- despite the whole point of APIs being that interoperability.

If Google wins, it means anyone will be able to hijack the syntax, semantics, and interfaces of an ecosystem verbatim for commercial ends to promote an incompatible implementation, like they've done with Android. To protect against this, patents and NDAs will proliferate, and black-box organization and SaaS business models will solidify as the only (commericially) sensible way of distributing software.

XCabbage2• 7 years ago

How did Google "hijacking" the Java API harm Oracle? If it didn't, why should anyone need to "protect" against such a thing happening in future?

Maybe I'm missing something, but your comment seems to boil down to "If Oracle wins, people won't be able to copy APIs, which is awful! If Google wins, people will be able to copy APIs, which is awful!" Surely you have to be on one side or the other?

jryan495• 7 years ago

It segmented the Java ecosystem into two parts. Android doesn't keep up-to-date with current Java version changes and creates friction. It seems similar to what Microsoft did to Java in the late 90's [0] (without the malicious intent).

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Java_Virtual_Machine

ocdtrekkie7• 7 years ago

Mobile phone companies used to license Java from Oracle. Instead, they all now use Android instead, a ripped off implementation of Java. Oracle claims they had intentions of moving further into the smartphone space (most mobile Java implementations a decade ago were on dumbphones, AFAIK), but Android shot their plans and the value of their purchase of Java to heck.

In short, Oracle has claimed they bought Java from Sun to make a mobile OS that would've been licensed to manufacturers, and by stealing the Java API from them, devalued that purchase by launching Android for free.

ErikVandeWater• 7 years ago

The Supreme Court mostly isn't about which side wins. They could come up with a useful way to adjudicate which wouldn't lead to either of the sets of costs you mention.

jonny_eh2• 7 years ago

If Google wins, it means anyone will be able to hijack the syntax, semantics, and interfaces of an ecosystem verbatim for commercial ends to promote an incompatible implementation

Hijacking means taking control away from someone, I don't see how that happened here.

ocdtrekkie7• 7 years ago

Arguably, APIs have been found copyrightable, and the solution is simple: Include a license with your API. In a lot of cases in the modern era, APIs have terms anyways, because they're tied to web services. So adding a clause about being able to implement them is trivial, for any intended use of an API.

The main difference is that developers will have more tools to fight unintended or unwanted uses of their API, such as clones, emulators, scraper tools, etc. There's concerns to be had, sure, but it's not the end of the world by any means, and a lot of those will fall under fair use in a way that Android does not.

pier255• 7 years ago

IANAL... but it seems to me copyrighting an API instead of the actual implementation would be like trying to copyright the idea of "chair" or "wheel" which is not possible AFAIK.

wuliwong9• 7 years ago

My understanding is that code is treated basically as a literary work [0] with copyrighting. So the API definition is a part of the codebase. I do not think the analogy to copyrighting an idea is applicable. Unless they are trying to separately just have a copyright on the API? If that is the case, I'm not even sure how it would have been filed?

[0] https://www.copyright.gov/eco/help-type.html

sovande• 7 years ago

A better metaphor is probably to look at an API as a design blueprint. For instance a blueprint of a house. Describing in detail all the components that goes into creating the house, plumbing, electricity, rooms etc. Clearly it is a lot of work to come up with such a design.

kstrauser• 7 years ago

In that analogy, Google used the blueprint at the level of "living room goes here; closet is next to the bathroom". They then redesigned the plumbing and electricity from scratch.

count• 7 years ago

It's a literary work. It's copying the table of contents, but writing your own chapter text.

I fail to see how it's not copyrightable as such. It appears to be a collection of facts (the interface of the implementation). These are not copyrightable, unless it meets the following:

"the work must be a collection and assembly of pre-existing material, facts, or data; the work must contain the selection, coordination, or arrangement of those materials; and the work is created by virtue of the particular selection, coordination, or arrangement of an original work of authorship."

I can't see how "arrangement of those materials" and "virtue of the particular selection or arrangement" isn't obvious here?

Oracle is pursuing the path where this case is literally about the contents of text files with words, which are supposedly well defined and understood under copyright law.

pier255• 7 years ago

Not sure if that is great metaphor either. Blueprints describe everything, including implementation.

RcouF1uZ4gsC2• 7 years ago

One thing I hope everyone agrees with is that API design is an art. Often coming up with a good API is as significant a task as actually implementing it. An API that is intuitive yet flexible and extensible is tricky to design.

If APIs are copyrightable, this actually might be good for open source projects such as Redis and MongoDb where cloud providers are just taking their API and creating implementations. This has been a huge issue for sustainability of these kinds of open source initiatives when a multi-billion dollar corporation can just come through, take the API and write their own implementation.

orthoxerox4• 7 years ago

Did Redis and MongoDB copyright their APIs?

icebraining9• 7 years ago

wuliwong9• 7 years ago

I'm looking for a distinction between code and an API. I think that the code that defined the APIs is copyrightable. If someone copied that code, it seems relatively cut and dry. Now if someone produced a similar interface but with entirely their own code, then it seems fine?

wvenable2• 7 years ago

Cooking is also art but recipes are not copyrightable.

Not all creative expression is copyrightable just because it's creative expression. You could argue that basically everything is creative expression at some level.

optymizer• 7 years ago

I've discussed this topic once with a developer who sided with Oracle, which was a fun exercise for me, because I side with Google.

The insight I got from that exercise was that, to him, APIs represent a product (e.g. I put a lot of effort into making this API, it's nice and clean, why should someone else be allowed to copy it?) and the implementation is typically straightforward grunt work, with intrinsically less value (e.g. we all know how to square a number).

As a developer, it was easy for me to sympathize with that thinking, because who hasn't been amazed by how elegant some of the APIs are and how difficult it is to create a simple, yet powerful API?

However, I believe that in the general case, it is the implementation that's the difficult part, which is why I'm against copyrighting APIs. Anyone can come up with an API for a Map, not everyone can create an efficient implementation of HashMap.

Doesn't this sound vaguely familiar? I think it's the same argument as "ideas vs execution", it's just that, as a community, we've discussed the pitfalls of ideas, NDAs and execution an order of magnitude more than copyrighting APIs vs implementation, and so there's less of a divide.

If you side with Oracle and you agree that execution > idea, then you should consider that implementation > API, and, similarly to how you can't copyright an idea, you shouldn't be able to copyright APIs.

In the case of Oracle vs Google, both the API and the implementation are trivial, which is a special case of the more general "API vs implementation", and it is unfortunate that a precedent will be set for the general case, based on a special case. That sounds like a recipe for future trouble.

wtallis6• 7 years ago

I put a lot of effort into making this API, it's nice and clean, why should someone else be allowed to copy it?

The problem is that copyright protection has requirements beyond the above sentiment, which can just as easily apply to something that needs to be patented rather than copyrighted. You can't get copyright protection just because you feel you deserve it.

shmerl2• 7 years ago

Abstract ideas can be hard. It's not about triviality of the APIs that should exclude them from copyrightability, it's about their abstractness. That's how you should bust such arguments.

panny• 7 years ago

Java Generics are Turing complete. [1] You can produce an entire program inside a Java API. The API is part of the implementation in Java.

The criteria for copyright is originality and creativity. [2] It doesn't matter if understanding hashcodes is hard. Mathematical functions are not copyrightable. [3] Whereas elegant vs inelegant APIs demonstrate there is creativity in the API design process. Google engineer Bob Lee agreed [4]

Q. Would you say that designing APIs is a creative activity?
THE WITNESS: Yes, absolutely.

Copyrights are not patents. Clean room designs are perfectly legal. [5] Google could have avoided the entire fight, but Google failed to prove they did a clean room design.

Quite the opposite, Oracle was able to show that Google made direct copies of the code. The evidence at trial showed that Google decompiled at least eight Java files and copied them each in their entirety. [6]

[1] https://arxiv.org/pdf/1605.05274.pdf

[2] https://copyright.uslegal.com/enumerated-categories-of-copyr...

[3] https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ31.pdf

[4] http://www.groklaw.net/pdf3/OraGoogle-398(Ex3).pdf

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_room_design

[6] http://www.groklaw.net/pdf3/OraGoogle-1123.pdf

TheFlyingFish• 7 years ago

I really only have two questions about this case:

1) The US legal code explicitly excludes "methods of operation" from being copyrightable. Does an API count as "methods of operation"? And if so, what ground does Oracle have left to stand on?

2) If this case goes Oracle's way, does this set the precedent that ANY re-implementations of an existing API are in violation of copyright? I don't know who now owns the original rights to Unix, but if they decide to come after Linux where does that leave us?

beefhash• 7 years ago

2) If this case goes Oracle's way, does this set the precedent that ANY re-implementations of an existing API are in violation of copyright? I don't know who now owns the original rights to Unix, but if they decide to come after Linux where does that leave us?

We can't know until a decision is made, but this could likely start a precedent for any re-implementations.

The curent copyright holders of UNIX are Micro Focus, who acquired it via buying Attachmade, who had bought Novell, who had bought UNIX System Laboratories from AT&T. Micro Focus mainly sells COBOL and is apparently hellbent on ignoring UNIX as much as possible (multiple people have tried to reach out to them about Ancient UNIX and possibly licensing some missing parts like PWB/UNIX and System III, but the best they've had is a salesperson being confused and trying to sell SUSE Linux). If they ever regain their institutional knowledge that they hold copyrights to UNIX and this decision happens, well, it's open season for Micro Focus v. Red Hat.

kevin_b_er3• 7 years ago

CFAC has ended "methods of operation" where software is concerned. The phrase no longer applies.

paganel• 7 years ago

Oracle now has a market cap of about $170 billion, give or take a few billion, I'm pretty sure that if a company like Google put its mind to it it could purchase Oracle outright.

It would also allow Google a very good entry on the enterprise market where it could push GCP down its clients' throats, imho there's no other way for them to catch up with AWS and Azure.

burtonator• 7 years ago

Buying oracle might kill them. Like a tiger eating a poisonous snake and getting bitten

grellas• 7 years ago

No tears will be shed, I am sure, if Google has to pay some billions to fatten the already fat pockets of Oracle but the decision by the Federal Circuit being appealed here made a hash out of key legal foundational items that facilitate the very idea of interoperability in the computing world and therefore cries out to be corrected.

My comment at the time the decision was rendered: "This ruling will do what its [the Federal Circuit's] prior expansive reading of patent law did: it will set up a legal standard that invites lawyers and litigants to engage in endless second-guessing over copyright and fair use in areas of connectivity and inter-operability in the computing world and this in turn, as a standing invitation to litigate, cannot be good for future development." (See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16691774 for fuller analysis)

The Supreme Court quite often fails to take up discretionary appeals even if the issues loom large for a particular industry or even if an important case was wrongly decided. Sometimes it does so to resolve conflicting rulings among lower federal courts on an important issue; other times, because a case raises important issues of public policy. Don't know if this case will fit the criteria (it didn't on its first cycle of appeal - see my comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9801251#9802457; also, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4050490#4051761).

I have long been an advocate for solid protection of IP rights but the Federal Circuit here has almost fetishized the idea of copyright protection to the point where it has, in the API and fair use areas, become a caricature of itself. Strong correction is needed on the legal merits of the case.

Let us hope that the high level of interest in the tech community, as revealed by the number and quality of amicus briefs filed, will prompt the Supreme Court to intervene and bring soundness and clarity to an important area of law that affects the tech world in profound ways.

monocasa10• 7 years ago

Sometimes it does so to resolve conflicting rulings among lower federal courts on an important issue; other times, because a case raises important issues of public policy. Don't know if this case will fit the criteria

It will. The CAFC's rulings are in open conflict with the normal court that would handle this, the ninth circuit.

lawrenceyan• 7 years ago

Commentary from someone working directly within the field is always appreciated. Thanks for taking the time to write this out.

jacques_chester2• 7 years ago

It would be easier and clearer, I think, for Congress to intervene. Copyright is a legislative creature, the judgements are about the meaning and scope of the legislation. Congress has the power to clarify it and thereby overrule any previous interpretation taken by any of the relevant courts.

javagram2• 7 years ago

IMO copyright protection is way too strong and long lasting for this type of thing.

The creation of something like Java should be protected by the patent system which at least has an expiration time of a couple decades rather than a century like copyright.

Google taking Java and reimplementing it without paying a penny to Sun (who was requiring a license to other manufacturers at the time) does seem unfair. But I think the law should provide something like the “FRAND” standard for patents, or the mandatory mechanical license for copyright, to prevent a company from blocking interoperability.

As far as who’s actually right on the law today.... the SCOTUS decisions will be interesting to read :-)

christkv• 7 years ago

If Oracle wins this lawsuits does that mean it’s the death kneel for AWS cloning open source wire protocols like MongoDB ?

shmerl2• 7 years ago

Supreme Court should bust the bad decision about copyrightability of APIs.

smadurange• 7 years ago

Is this copyability issue for software APIs or more general? I feel like if I copied the full user interface of an iPhone (the way it looks and interacts with the user) and provided my own imementation I'm still liable?

Google/Oracle’s $9B Copyright Case Could Be Headed for the Supreme Court

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